Ranking SoftBank's most active VC co-investors

Big rounds. Bigger valuations. That's what SoftBank is known for, at least since it launched its massive tech-focused Vision Fund last year. Through the $98
billion Vision Fund and its other investment arms, the Japanese telecom giant has made headlines for taking a 15% stake in Uber, pouring $4.4 billion into WeWork and injecting $1.4 billion in Paytm. But SoftBank also leads smaller deals and backs companies alongside other investors. We’ve taken a look at which firms co-invest in venture capital deals with SoftBank most often, using data from the PitchBook Platform. Lerer Hippeau holds the number one spot by a long shot, in part because the VC firm was said to have taken over two of SoftBank Capital's early-stage VC funds in 2015, a move that likely took place at least partly due to Eric Hippeau's tenure
as a managing partner at SoftBank Capital.
[ PitchBook ]

Meet John Hennessy and Dave Patterson, Silicon Valley’s first disruptors

Dave Patterson and John Hennessy were told that their idea was “going to destroy the computing industry.” The warning was right. In the 1970s and into the 1980s, the industry was dominated on the hardware side by two companies: IBM and DEC. Patterson and Hennessy’s development of RISC, a more efficient computer processor found today in billions of devices, completely upended the established order. [ Recode ]

Crypto Billionaire Sued by Sequoia After Deal Falls Apart

A legal dispute between Zhao Changpeng, founder of the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange, and a unit of Sequoia Capital is offering a rare glimpse into one of the digital-asset industry’s fastest-growing startups. Sequoia sued Zhao over a funding deal gone awry, according to Hong Kong court filings on March 26 and April 24. The filings shed light on Zhao’s interactions with big-name venture capital firms and reveal details about how they’ve valued Binance, the exchange that Zhao started just nine months ago. [ Bloomberg ]

WeWork documents reveal it owes $18 billion in rent and is burning through cash as it seeks more funding

The office-leasing startup WeWork plans to raise more funding through a $500 million bond sale, according to the Financial Times.

It's the first time the company is raising money from debt investors after it raised billions in venture capital from backers such as SoftBank.

WeWork disclosed startling underlying numbers for its business in its bond-sale documents, such as that it owes $18 billion in rent.

BuzzFeed and Netflix have announced a new partnership in the form of a streaming television series. Starting in early July, Netflix will stream a show called Follow This, which follows BuzzFeed Newsjournalists as they do their reporting. [ Fast Company ]

Uber’s first diversity report under CEO Dara Khosrowshahi shows Uber is still mostly white and male

Uber, long opposed to reporting the demographics of its employees, has released its second diversity report ever and first public report under new CEO Dara Khosrowshahi. Little progress has been made, particularly with regard to representation from black and Latinx employees.

The company saw a drop in black employees, which now make up 8.1 percent of its workforce, down from 8.8 percent last year. There was a small uptick in Latinx workers at 6.1 percent of the
employee base, up from 5.6 percent. [ Re/Code ]

China-based online education companies just launched an aggressive hiring spree in search of U.S. teachers​